Phoenix Burst

Artist Adolph Gottlieb American, 1903–1974

Date1973

MediumOil and alkyd resin on canvas

Dimensions60 x 48 in. (152.4 x 121.9 cm)
Frame: 61 x 48 3/4 x 1 3/4 in. (154.9 x 123.8 x 4.4 cm)

ClassificationsPaintings

Credit LineGift of Mary and Jim Patton

Object number2014.20.24

On View

Not on view

Label TextCreated in the last year of the artist’s life, while he was in a wheelchair and had the use of only one arm, Phoenix Burst is one of the last works of Adolph Gottlieb, a pioneer of abstract expressionism. By the time Gottlieb painted this work, he had fully developed his characteristic style that featured a vibrantly colored, circular form hovering above an earthlike mass of broad and opaque strokes. In this piece a tomato-red circle draws the eye tightly into the center of the canvas before leading it back out again. Swirling drips of red around the center point help soften the transition to the rest of the canvas and connect the multiple elements of the composition. Speckles and spindly lines of black paint lead down in an intertwining trail to the bottom of the canvas. The solid mass of black anchoring the painting conveys a gestural portrayal of earth. Compositionally, Phoenix Burst is less visually split than many of Gottlieb’s other Bursts, in which viewers can identify the influence of a grid structure from his earlier works.
[J. Dasal, 2014]ProvenanceCreated New York, 1973; collection of the artist; Adolph and Esther Gottlieb Foundation, New York; [Knoedler & Co., New York]; Mary and James R. Patton Jr., Great Falls, VA, May 1992; given to NCMA, 2014.

Published ReferencesT.R. [Timothy Riggs], entry for Captain’s Watch in Space, Abstraction and Freedom: Twentieth-Century Art from the Collection of Mary and Jim Patton (Chapel Hill: Ackland Art Museum 2011), no. 8, illus. (color) 45.

Marc-Alain Ouaknin, La Genése de la Genése (Paris: Editions Diane de Selliers, 2019), illus. (color) 144.

Edward Falco, Wolf Moon Blood Moon: Poems (Baton Rouge, LA: Lousiana State University Press, 2017), illus. (color)Exhibition HistoryChapel Hill, NC, Ackland Art Museum, “Space, Abstraction and Freedom: Twentieth-Century Art from the Collection of Mary and Jim Patton,” September 9–November 11, 2001, no. 8, illus (color), 45.

Raleigh, NC, North Carolina Museum of Art, “The Patton Collection: A Gift to North Carolina,” March 28–August 23, 2015.

Raleigh, NC, North Carolina Museum of Art, "The People's Collection, Reimagined," October 7, 2022–October 30, 2023. Object Rights Statement

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